USTA League Tennis is Growing! But all is not positive ...

You may be surprised by the subject given that I've written about the declining participation in USTA League in the past, and that is true Nationally.  Since 2013, the number of players playing in the Adult leagues in all divisions from 18+ to 65+ has dropped from about 276K to 263K.  That isn't a huge drop, but it has been pretty steady.

But that decline is not happening in every section or area.  I've noted before that sections like the Pacific Northwest and Southern California have actually been growing, and the 40+ and 55+ divisions have shown growth as well.  But that means some areas and divisions are shrinking quicker to offset that growth.

This all comes up because in my area (Seattle) our growth actually appears to be causing problems.  I wrote last week that our local playoff format is changing to have fewer wildcards for second place teams in sub-flights, in fact there will be 31% fewer teams advancing to local playoffs under the new rule this 40+ season than there would have been under the old format.

The reason I've heard for this change is that as we've had growth, that means there are more teams and more sub-flights and thus more courts required for local playoffs if first and second place teams from each sub-flight all advance.  This all makes sense, but apparently, it is very hard to secure enough courts for all the teams.  Why wouldn't the USTA's money for courts be as good as any other user?

Some clubs are private and are reluctant to give up their entire facility for a weekend as I'm sure members will complain and other (perhaps lucrative) programs they offer, e.g. juniors, would suffer as well.  But apparently even public facilities aren't wanting to give up the whole facility and keep some courts for instruction or other programs.  The result is fewer courts could be secured and fewer teams will be advancing, putting a much higher priority on the regular season.

Not that I doubted what I heard, but I had do do some checking to confirm this growth and to see if the problem is real.

Taking a look at the 40+ league in Seattle since its inception, I looked at the number of teams and the number of rostered players and indeed there has been growth.

In 2013, there were 162 teams and it grew all the way to 264 in 2017 or 63% growth.  For rostered players, it went from 2,404 to 3,858, a 60% growth.  That would be noticeable and would certainly increase the number of courts required for playoffs.

The 18+ season has not yet started, but it too has grown in Seattle unlike most areas.  Teams grew from 274 in 2013 to 362 in 2017, 32% growth, and players grew from 3,610 to 4,907, 36% growth.

What is interesting is that for 2018, the 40+ team count actually dropped from 264 to 247, but the player count increased from 3,661 to 3,858.  I'm not sure the reason but one could speculate that facilities are even reducing the number of teams they'll sponsor/allow so teams are down, but there is still player growth and so rosters are now larger.

So there indeed is evidence to indicate there has been dramatic growth in teams and players, and perhaps facilities are tightening up the courts available for USTA both for regular league play with team counts down and also for playoffs.

How do we solve this?

Perhaps we were just lucky to have courts available and securable in the past so that first and second place teams could all advance.  It could be that it is more normal to have just first place teams advance and we are just losing a perk few other areas had.

But perhaps this indicates there is demand for more courts and there is an opportunity for facilities to expand or for new facilities to be built.

Last, players should talk with their facilities and encourage them to choose to support local playoffs and make their facilities available.  We already typically use more than one facility for playoffs, why not add a third?  Clearly club members want to play, shouldn't facilities support those members?

What do you think?  Is there a problem?  If so, what is a solution?  Or do we just need to suck it up and accept that second place teams won't be going to playoffs?

With fewer teams making Seattle area local playoffs, are the men's sub-flights balanced?

I wrote last week that a change in playoff format is going to result in 31% fewer teams making local playoffs in the 40 & over division in the Seattle area.  Specifically, where last year every sub-flight had the first and second place teams advance to playoffs, now, at most levels, just one second place team from all the sub-flights will advance.

This clearly puts a premium on the regular season.  In past years, a team could lose a match, perhaps even two, and still make it to local playoffs.  Now, that is less likely to be the case and there very well could be teams with just one loss that don't advance.

Those reading closely will note that there is a spot for at least one second place team to advance, so you might think that this will make things equitable and allow that really good team that got unlucky and had to face another really good team to advance anyway.  But is that really the case?

For that theory to be true, it requires that all the sub-flights be reasonably balanced so that every second place team have a reasonable chance of winning that coveted wildcard.  If they aren't balanced, one sub-flight could have three or four very good teams and beat up on each other resulting in a second place team with at least two losses, while a weaker flight could have a weak second place team lose their one important match but have a record that appears better than those in the tougher flight.

So, I went about checking on how balanced the flights are to see if teams will have an equal chance or if things are stacked in favor of some sub-flights.  To do this, I looked at the top-8 averages for each team using my ratings as of 1/1/18.  This is the best gauge of how strong a team could be known to be prior to the season starting.

Note of course that players can improve during the year, self-rated players aren't accounted for, and player availability and teams doling out equal playing time can result in teams with high top-8 averages not doing as well as expected.

For the below, I'm looking at just the men.  I wrote about the women's flights here.

The 2.5 men have just one flight so we'll skip them.

The 3.0 men have three flights and 28 teams.

• Flight A has the top-3 teams and five of the top-7 so definitely appears to be the toughest.
• Flight B on the other hand doesn't show up until T9 and then has three of the bottom 4.
• Flight C fits in between but does have four of the top-12.

Certainly some disparity here, can flight A with all its strong teams get the wildcard?

The 3.5 men have four flights and 38 teams.

• Flight A doesn't show up on the list until T11 and has three of the bottom 4 so appears to be the weakest flight.
• Flight B has four of the top-10 but is otherwise spread out pretty evenly.
• Flight C has five of the top-9 so appears quite strong.
• Flight D has the top team, but then five between T11 and T17.

There are some real differences here too.

The 4.0 men have three flights and 30 teams.

• Flight A is at the top with two of the top-3, five in the middle 8, then three of the bottom 5.
• Flight B has three in the top-10, then fills all of the spots from 20-25.
• Flight C is weighted towards the top with six of the top-13.

The flights are different but no one is really strong or weak.

The 4.5+ men have two flights and 16 teams, the flights alternating the top-7 spots.

Again, one flight shows a big disparity and another a noticeable one.  We'll see who takes advantage of it.

With fewer teams making Seattle area local playoffs, are the women's sub-flights balanced?

I wrote last week that a change in playoff format is going to result in 31% fewer teams making local playoffs in the 40 & over division in the Seattle area.  Specifically, where last year every sub-flight had the first and second place teams advance to playoffs, now, at most levels, just one second place team from all the sub-flights will advance.

This clearly puts a premium on the regular season.  In past years, a team could lose a match, perhaps even two, and still make it to local playoffs.  Now, that is less likely to be the case and there very well could be teams with just one loss that don't advance.

Those reading closely will note that there is a spot for at least one second place team to advance, so you might think that this will make things equitable and allow that really good team that got unlucky and had to face another really good team to advance anyway.  But is that really the case?

For that theory to be true, it requires that all the sub-flights be reasonably balanced so that every second place team have a reasonable chance of winning that coveted wildcard.  If they aren't balanced, one sub-flight could have three or four very good teams and beat up on each other resulting in a second place team with at least two losses, while a weaker flight could have a weak second place team lose their one important match but have a record that appears better than those in the tougher flight.

So, I went about checking on how balanced the flights are to see if teams will have an equal chance or if things are stacked in favor of some sub-flights.  To do this, I looked at the top-8 averages for each team using my ratings as of 1/1/18.  This is the best gauge of how strong a team could be known to be prior to the season starting.

Note of course that players can improve during the year, self-rated players aren't accounted for, and player availability and teams doling out equal playing time can result in teams with high top-8 averages not doing as well as expected.

For the below, I'm looking at just the women.  I'll follow up with an analysis of the men.

For the women, the 2.5 level has just one sub-flight so no issues there.

The 3.0 women have four sub-flights and 39 teams, and it is not balanced it appears.

• Flight A is pretty tough with eight teams ranked in my top-24 including teams ranked T2 and T5.
• Flight B doesn't have any team in the top-4, but has four in the top-11 so very tightly bunched.
• Flight C is arguably even tougher at the top with three of the top-8 including #1, T2, and T5!
• As you might expect, Flight D ends up being far weaker with only three in the top-14.

It is very possible that sub-flights A, B, and C beat up on each other and the second place team from sub-flight D takes advantage.

The 3.5 women have five sub-flights and 43 teams and some serious haves and have nots.

• Flight A has no team in the top-6 so is not top heavy, but has eight of the next 18 so has a lot of depth.
• Flight B is stacked with five in the top-9 and then three more in the next 11!  It will be tough for a second place team to advance here.
• Flight C is very weak on paper, just one team in the top-25!  Worse, it has the bottom 2, three of the bottom 4, and six of the bottom 10.
• Flight D is fairly strong with four in the top-13.
• Flight E is not very strong with just two in the top-26.

It appears flight C will be a cakewalk for the top team, and flight B will be a dog fight.

The 4.0 women have three flights and 28 teams.

• Flight A has three of the top-7 teams.
• Flight B has #1 and T2 but then no other until T12.
• Flight C has five of the top-11.

These flights do have a different make-up, but nothing egregiously out of whack it appears.

The 4.5+ women have two flights and 11 teams with two teams from each flight advancing.  Flight B has the top-2 teams and flight A the bottom three, but the trick here on top of that is that in flight A, teams don't have a balanced schedule and someone will get to play the bottom team twice while another team will play the top team twice.

In summary, from the above there is certainly not perfect balance between the flights, and in some cases there is a huge difference, so it will be interesting to see how that plays out and who the wildcard teams are.